After a crushing 7-5 loss to No. 10 Georgia in the conclusion of the regular season, Texas A&M baseball gave itself a chance at a playoff berth with a 9-0 win over Mississippi State in the first round of the Southeastern Conference Tournament.
With a full helping of SEC games to digest, fans can easily define the story of the Aggies’ 2025 campaign as one plagued by inconsistencies. From once-burning bats turned into cold water to stout pitching turned sour, the list goes on for reasons as to why the former-unanimous No. 1-ranked team fell so far from glory.
But they’re not gone yet as the same trials and tribulations that damned many of the Fightin’ Farmers contests became the very thing that sealed the fate of Mississippi State.
Superb at-bats complemented a dropped fly ball and an error to secure a bases-loaded situation for junior center fielder Jace LaViolette — a projected first-rounder who struggled greatly while going hitless through 18 visits to the plate — however, such struggles did not deter the Katy native as he hit his 18th home run of the season to take hold of a 6-0 lead for the Aggies.
“It’s about winning pitch-to-pitch and putting the ball in play,” LaViolette said. “I was going through a little streak without putting the ball in play, but coming out here ready to play after waiting yesterday. We are not going to stop fighting until we’re told we can’t play anymore.”
The threat of a short stay in Hoover, Alabama, motivated the Maroon and White to jump ahead early, but with a trip to the NCAA Tournament in jeopardy, fighting to play one more game was the top priority for coach Michael Earley’s squad.
Home run royalty was not hard to come by in a faceoff against the Bulldogs, with the top-3 active long-ball leaders finding themselves just a dugout away from each other. LaViolette and graduate third baseman Wyatt Henseler account for 68 and 66 home runs each, respectively, while Mississippi State senior first baseman Hunter Hines leads the nation by going yard 69 times.
As far as pitching, redshirt junior left-handed Ryan Prager blanked one of the SEC’s most dynamic offenses by showing off his improved form through six innings of work. Walks have led to the demise of many solid games for the Dallas lefty, but in his fourth win of the season, Prager erased free passes with strikeouts to give himself the chance to start one last time.
“I’m honored to be able to put on this uniform and represent this university,” Prager said. “I’d be wrong to say the draft hasn’t crossed my mind, but for now it’s about taking care of this season and giving the guys all I got.”
This begs the question of where the stability has gone from such a talent-rich roster. Key player injuries surely put a bump in the road for A&M, but for a team that was one game removed from a national championship one year prior, it’s hard to believe that the Maroon and White train could derail in such a crazy fashion.
However, as the postseason begins, that whole narrative goes out the window and the road to a championship becomes defined by single elimination, one game at a time.
With essentially a completely new slate to work with, Prager and LaViolette led the charge for one more shot.
After taking a very comfortable 9-0 lead into the bottom of the seventh inning, it was time for sophomore right-handed pitcher Clayton Freshcorn to shore up the defense for the last frames of work for the Aggies’ round one contest. Another victim of inconsistent play, Freshcorn took a page out of his predecessor’s book and kept the Bulldogs’ boat underwater with a strikeout of his own.
But for an A&M team eager to right the wrongs of the past, run-rule territory was right around the corner for an offense that had only put up three runs since its six-run explosion in the top of the second. Aggieland’s finest batters were presented and dealt with by Mississippi State on the mound and the next three outs would be taken care of by senior RHP Brad Rudis, punching their ticket to round two.
Rudis — a veteran of the Maroon and White program — has been a dependable presence out of the bullpen for years as the last remaining piece of the 2022 College World Series team that seemed so long ago. A standard of excellence was established following that historic campaign, but with a new coaching regime in place, the horizon looks hazy for the once-constant contenders.
Winning a first round contest is the first step in clearing the fog away, and freshman RHP Gavin Lyons was the man to do it. After turning a double play, Lyons oversaw the final pitch of the game that landed in LaViolette’s glove, rendering the Bulldogs scoreless through nine innings.
The Aggies haven’t played their last as they set eyes on a second-round matchup with the six-seed Auburn at 12 p.m. on Wednesday.
